The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1887-09-28

Maurice Thompson Relates Some of His Ex-
periences with Unreasonable Critics.
New York Critic.
The following letter from Mr. Thompson was
not written for publication, but is printed with
his consent:
CHAMPIONSHIPS Ind. Aug. %, 1887.
1.-THE Lounger's note Aug. %, regarding
Daudets experience with the Provencas
account of 'Numa Roumestan,' .Taetarin,' etc,
reminds me the trouble l have had with Miss
Crabb, young woman reporter for tho news
papers. who figures in two of my obscure little
novels can not say how many wrathful letters
I have had from young ladies who thought they
could not be mistaken in assuming that meant
to caricature them. Each individual offered CO.
gent reasons for declaring that she was the very
Miss Crabb One, rather more realistic than
the rest, laid claim TO the receding chin and ir-
regular teeth of my creation. Yet another
cused me of being the man who had tried to get
her place q newspaper, failing which had
sought revenge in making fun OF her. This
when / never had heard os her before. But the
most amusing experience was to be told by
Boston critic that had failed to put "Hoosiers"
into my Indiana story, "A Banker of Bankers.
Vile" OF course this critic was perfectly sim
cere, and believed that to depict Indiana social
illiterate backwoods folk. Foreigners are
laughed at for expecting to find buffalo and elk
in the country around Boston and New York.
and it is time Eastern people should know that
Indiana is not frontier settlement in the year
1887. Not long ago the editor of perhaps the
greatest literary magazine IN America wrote to
zines subscriptions and sales we've in the West
l wrote "a Banker of Bankersvillev to depict
social life in an average Indiana town city,
and drew directly from my experience,
observation, knowledge. Here my predicament
is just the reverse of M. Daudets and Mr.. Cables
and Miss McLeans; for the Indiana critics agree
that have truly represented Indiana life, while
some of the New England and New York critics
aver that / have not
So, when my little novel. IA Tallahassee Girl"
first appeared, anonymously, very pleasant re-
view of it in the Critic concluded thus: Tho
sketches of Southern life vivid and enter
tanning. evidently by one who has been there,
though the observation might seem TOO carefully
minute to be that of a native SoutheTner.
Neither has the criticism exactly n Northern
flavor and we half suspect that the story has
something of English origin" The American,
of Philadelphia said of the Same story really.
it is American, through and through" The
Boston Literary World said that the story con-
veyed ''as vivid and immediate sense OF a
Southern center like Tallahassee. its people, it's
spirit and its surroundings as any writing
could possibly give The Atlanta Constitution
said: SAT first glance ir would
could give US so genuine a picture OF
a very familiar phase of Southern society," and
presently added The author may turn out
be Northerner of weak lungs strong brains
and genial mind These things were said
while the author was incog.. but the
secret was unlocked there came to me shower
of letters from the South. accusing me of mis-
representing Southern life, Southern society and
Southern character. Then too. the Northern
critics began to see that had compared North
people with Southern people to the discredit
OF the former; and to cap the trouble Paul
Hayne, my true friend. wrote me from Copso
HILL declaring that had caricatured the